zZzZz easy ... GOROSEI or RAYLEIGH>SHANKS>MIHAWK>SHIRYU>VISTA>ZORO (but obviously would be the strongest by the end). It's not really hard to figure this out lol... Mihawk and Shanks interaction obviously implied Shanks is stronger than Mihawk hence why Mihawk always want to fight him, but shanks doesn't want to fight back it's like Shanks rubbing a kid's head and since he lost his arm Mihawk obviously can't fight him when he's at his fullest to test his strength hence he has a similar mentality like Zoro (his pupil) want to be the best challenging himself constantly with someone "stronger" not weaker that's his goal and it's a cliche for swordsmanship crap. Rayleigh fought Admirals in his prime 3 vs 1 even though he's old now he's a ****in boss and the reaction kuma and everyone else gave him obviously they more than respect, but also fear and idolize his prestige presence. Kuma is technically consider the strongest shichibukai (it's implied) even stronger than Mihawk and if you pay attention to the story Kuma had some difficulty, ill, defunct, but still insanely strong so much Rayleigh had to step in and barely hold it off. Anyways off topic back to swordsman. I would assume Luffy's father should be somewhere up here even though he's obviously a Haki user, but most Haki user with no devil fruit use a sword sort of like a mark of a pirate theme. So that's the list, break down, logic and crap currently Zoro on the bottom of the list, but obviously he'll be on top because that's the point of this type of genre,theme, storyline, character build and crap not to mention the precursors, trend, patterns. If you really want to add in farther on Blackbeard would probably be in there too he does use a short sword even though he's a devil user and based on pirate legacy of blackbeard and how this story was set up Blackbeard would be the ultimate villain near the end of either the arc or story.
